The front seat passenger had not been belted in, and his face hit the windshield, squirting blood from his nose across the inside of the glass.

In the back of the van Wheeler was thrown forward but his restraints sent him banging back into his headrest, simultaneously both saving and dazing him.

But the remaining two Russians were unscathed. Seat belts were unfastened, guns came out of jackets, the sliding door was opened, and the first man leapt out onto the two-laned street in a cloud of smoke and steam from the damaged engines of both vehicles.

While one of the Bratva men trained his weapon on the gray vehicle that was crumpled into the front of the van, the second man reached back in, unfastened Marty Wheeler’s seat belt, and pulled him out by the collar.

* * *

• • •

Zack Hightower climbed to his hands and knees, just twenty-five yards up the road from where the crash happened. He’d taken a shortcut through a parking lot to get there first and floored it, then angled his Kia at the approaching van. He opened his door and rolled out onto the street, banging virtually his entire body into the asphalt as his momentum carried him forward.

He was still rolling forward as his vehicle scored a direct hit with the oncoming van twenty-five yards away.

But rolling along the street had been no big win for Zack Hightower. His knees and elbows and back screamed in pain, and it took him longer than he would have liked to recover enough to stand upright, pull the Smith and Wesson out from the retention holster under his torn blazer, and raise it towards the car crash.

Brewer had instructed him to meet force with equal force, and he intended to do that, more or less. But Zack had no interest in a fair fight, so when he saw the first man step out of the steam, his pistol leveled at the car Zack had just exited, the American went lethal, firing twice into the man before he even looked up the street.

A woman standing on the sidewalk near Zack screamed, and this sent his gun spinning in her direction, but only until he saw that she was no threat, and then his attention, along with his pistol’s barrel, shifted back to the wreck. He advanced on it, weapon high, and then he saw two men close together, moving out from the smoke and steam.

He recognized Marty Wheeler and took the other man for an armed extraction asset, so he shifted aim off the CIA man and onto the unknown individual.

A pistol jutted from the man’s hand, and for Zack that was more than enough justification to go weapons free. He shot the man twice, once winging him on the left side of his head and once in his upper chest, knocking him back from Wheeler a few steps, but somehow the man did not drop.

The gunman raised his weapon towards Zack, who fired again and again, finally spinning him down to the pavement with a half dozen .40 caliber rounds in him.

And then Marty Wheeler began to sprint off.

“Shit!” Zack said, because he fucking hated to run.

CHAPTER 47

   Suzanne Brewer had last heard from Romantic three minutes earlier, telling her he was going to attempt to cut off Wheeler’s access to the Peruvian embassy on Sloane Street. She didn’t know exactly what he meant by this, but she drove along Knightsbridge Road, planning on seeing her asset holding Wheeler and the others at gunpoint, and she thought about driving up on that crazy scene, right here in the heart of London.

Brewer asked herself what the hell she was doing here. She was not a field asset, and the only reason she’d told Romantic she would come to his aid was that she knew he would tell Hanley if she didn’t come. She didn’t know what she could do to help; she was unarmed and only knew her way because she’d punched Romantic’s location into Google Maps while she drove.

But here she was, barreling into danger in a blacker-than-black operation that would do nothing to advance her career, even if she somehow managed to save the fucking queen in the process.

Her phone rang and she answered it, expecting it to be her asset, but instead it was Matt Hanley.

“I’m at the embassy, meeting with conference security officials, giving them vague and useless information about a new threat we’ve identified. Can’t tell them about Mars because of their leak, and I need you here to—”

Brewer interrupted. “Sir . . . the mole is Wheeler. He’s been picked up by some kind of security crew here in London and they seem to be making their way towards the Peruvian embassy in Knightsbridge. Romantic is in pursuit with orders to stop the vehicle by any means necessary, and I am going to the location to assist.”

Hanley did not reply.

“Sir, did you—”

“I’ve known Marty Wheeler since the Army. Thirty fucking years, Suzanne.”

“The evidence is pretty clear, Matt. Romantic says Wheeler ran an SDR before switching vehicles, loading up with some fighting-age Slavic-looking men.”

“Not Marty.”

“Matt . . . the asset is seconds away from attempting a stop on the vehicle.”

After another delay, Hanley said, “Dammit! Okay. All right. If Zack gets him, tell him not to bring him here to the embassy.”

“Sir?”

“We need to interrogate him outside the official chain of custody. I’ll call you back with an address, somewhere out of the way.”

Brewer closed her eyes a moment in deep irritation. “Matt, you can’t interrogate a senior executive of the CIA off book.”

“Who the hell says I can’t? Certainly not the director. He’d want me to get this sorted out as quickly and as quietly as possible.”

Brewer just said, “Yes, sir,” told him she would be standing by for the location of the safe house, and then disconnected the call. After she did this she screamed in the car. “Shit!”

She hated the position she’d been put in working for Hanley, and told herself that once she plugged the leak named Marty Wheeler, she would begin putting all her efforts into finding a way out of this morass before she ended up dead or in prison.

* * *

• • •

Hightower ran in his Western roper boots, finally catching up to Wheeler as he tried to cross Knightsbridge Road, but was forced to stop because the traffic was too heavy. The big blond American with the beard and sideburns reached out and grabbed the thin white-haired man by the neck, then pulled him along the sidewalk.

Zack sucked in a few breaths before speaking, then said, “Not a big fan of runnin’, Martin, gotta be honest with ya.”

He kept his hand on his prisoner’s neck, tight in back, pushing him onward quickly now.

Wheeler himself was wheezing from the forty-five-second sprint. “What . . . what do you want?”

“To shoot you in the motherfucking heart for making me chase your ass, but I’d probably just get in trouble. So instead, you and I are gonna go to the embassy. The U.S. one, not the Peruvian one.”